Scalpels are regularly used by surgeons and other health care professionals for making incisions during an operating procedure. Typically, the operating room assistant (which may be a nurse, technician or another doctor) "slaps" the scalpel into the surgeon's hand in a predetermined orientation, so that the surgeon can "feel" the scalpel and automatically grip its handle without taking his or her eyes away from the patient or the instrumentation. If the predetermined orientation is not closely followed, the nurse's or surgeon's hand may be cut or nicked. The same hazard may be encountered when the surgeon transfers the scalpel back to the assistant.
These nicks or cuts, besides being uncomfortable and distracting, may result in blood or body fluid exposure from the patient to the surgeon or other health care professional (and vice versa) and hence may lead to the spreading of infectious diseases. Concern over this situation has become especially acute since the appearance of the human immune deficiency virus (or "HIV"). Indeed, such cuts have already been blamed, by some health care providers, for cases of HIV infection in their profession. Consequently, some individual surgeons or health care providers have stopped performing surgical operations, rather than risk the chances of inadvertently contracting the deadly HIV from an infected patient. There are similar concerns with the Hepatitis B virus (or "HBV").
The risks associated with scalpel cuts during an operating room procedure are greater than those associated with needle sticks; but even there, the problem is becoming alarming. In a study made by the Needle Stick Surveillance Group of the Centers For Disease Control ("CDC") out of 3,978 known punctures from patients known to be HIV positive, 13 health care workers got infected or roughly 1 out of 300. Thus, from a single needle stick while treating an AIDS patient in an operating room or other environment, the chances are roughly 1 out of 300 that the surgeon, nurse or other individual health care provider will sero-convert and become HIV positive. If a surgeon, nurse or assistant is cut by a scalpel while conducting a surgical procedure in an operating room (rather than a needle stick) the risk is much greater simply because, first, there is more blood involved and, secondly, the surface area of the wound is larger.
In order to solve this problem, the prior art has disclosed guarded scalpels. Examples are U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,906,626 and 5,071,426 and German Offenlegungsschrift DE 37 22 899 A1. However, and for various reasons, these guarded scalpels are not completely satisfactory; hence are not in current widespread use in hospitals and clinics.
The prior art has also disclosed a microsurgical knife with a locking blade guard, as for example, U.S. Pat. 4,735,202 used for ophthalmological purposes. The structure and intended purpose, however, are not suitable for general surgical use.
Another example of the prior art is U.S. Pat. No. 4,499,898, which discloses a surgical knife with a controllably extendable blade and a gauge therefor. Again, this disclosure is intended for very delicate surgery and is not suitable for a general purpose guarded scalpel.
While protective gloves aid in reducing the chances of being cut during a surgical procedure, these gloves are by no means foolproof; and such cuts are still quite common. Even when two sets of gloves are utilized, full protection is not afforded to the health care provider, for many times the blade cuts right through both sets of gloves. Also, utilizing two sets of gloves reduces finger dexterity and is distracting, interfering with the intended surgical procedure.
This situation has become so pronounced that some leading surgeons, as well as nurses and other individual health care providers, have abandoned their respective practices altogether.
In the operating room, time is of the essence and seconds count; the mental concentration and physical effort are intense; and distractions must be avoided at all times.